The Loneliness That Dawned Upon A World
by nordicunicorn
Summary: Insanity and loneliness go hand in hand. This is obvious in a post-apocalyptic world where even the starlight have betrayed the skies and men have turned back to beasts. In the end, is living worth more than sanity? Critique is appreciated, as always!
1. Prelude for Confusion and Fear

_Crack._

A loud snap rings through the air. It echoes off the walls of the ravine and plants itself into two pairs of ears of which only one picks it up.

The other pair is damaged, broken, beyond repair.

They look fine, but on the inside, the ear drum vibrates but no nerve hairs react. No electric impulses are sent to the brain from the inner ear, no reaction from the possessor of it all.

There is only silence in that head, only darkness, a non-existent mind, it is an empty container.

The owner of the other pair reacts. A pair of fully functioning red eyes jerk open and dart around for the source of the sound.

Its ears work frantically to recognize the faintest change in the stillness, past the echo, past the heavy mute of the ravine, past the birdsong that isn't there but should be, past all the nothingness that creates a space of dullness around the two bodies on the gravel and stone covered, gray ground.

It shifts and strokes a strand of silver out of its eyes, tense and still cautiously scanning the areas around them. A quick peek to the left, a longer look to the right.

Yes, he is still there.

Next to the red-eyed, silver-haired creature with the suspicious eyes is the shape of a tall, blond man of strong build. His eyes are slightly opened, a milky white setting over once blue irises. He is leaned back towards the rock as if though he was resting, but he is unnaturally stiff and his arms simply lay at his sides, not folded up or playfully toying with the grime of the floor or rubbing his eyes to wake up like any normal set of arms on a person should be, no, they simply lay at his sides.

Stiff.

Cold.

Dead.

The silver haired creature slowly gathers its feet under itself. It is, by the looks of it, a man with a gene mutation known as albinism. Ocular albinism, to be specific. His almost-white skin, sterling turf of hair and red eyes twaddle-tell him apart from any regular being of mankind.

He slowly, slowly rises to his feet, eyes still darting, and makes that ever so slight change in human posture that indicates that he is on guard, he has acknowledged the presence of someone or something in his nearby, he is aggressive and oh yes, he will fight if he has to.

A small pebble comes bouncing down the ravine. Through the morning fog of this mute world, the sounds of rock on rock rings loud, clear and disturbing.

Something is there.

The albino man has noticed it, too.

Another pebble comes bouncing down, a couple more following.

The man standing recognizes the sound and movement.

Eyes and ears work just fine on this man.

He can hear the rocks clear, for through the silence it is as if they were right besides him rather than fifty meters off in the distance. He flinches at the rare sound of voices and is quick to draw back into the fold created between the cold man and himself, covering the still body and himself with a blanket the same color as the distorted world surrounding them.

A dusty, unsaturated and ashy gray.


	2. Beware of Silent Canaries

The voices in the distance become louder and clearer within minutes. They sound rather distressed and out of breath, two or perhaps three vocal chords and tongues struggling to accomplish an understandable language in between fast and shallow breaths.

A man and a woman, that's for sure.

The albino creature of man is silent and still under the blanket, yet still seems tense and somewhat shocked at the sound of voices.

How long has it been since he last heard voices?

Voices that weren't torn in agony?

Voices that weren't rustling up the last almost-human shrieks they would ever emit?

For a second he is deep in thought, gears of his human mind rusty but hard at work, and so allows himself to pull the threadbare blanket down to just underneath his eyes.

His hair looks just like the surrounding gray.

His corners of mouth pull up just a slight bit into something like a grin at the apparent thought of his albinism once acting to his advantage.

Still, he moves slowly, not wanting the movement to give him away.

Careful not to uncover the body next to him, he decides to move further and gently climbs out of the folds.

The once beautiful, black and navy uniform that would have - should have - given him away is gray as well, only a fraction of the expensive, exclusive and highly decorated creation it once was.

There, he sees them. The red and bloodshot eyes slowly adjust to the distance, and his brain slowly begins to uncover the almost forgotten language skills buried under survival instincts.

The human brain is starting to function again.

Eardrum vibrates, nerve hairs react to the movements of the fluid in the cochlea. Electric impulses sent to the brain, which finally starts to translate sounds into words and words into sentences, and then gives the sentences a context and a meaning.

That's how it should be.

The look on his face tells of confusion.

Funny how something that used to be so familiar can turn so distant in such a short amount of time.

Funny how it is a tongue long spoken by this man, a tongue he never thought to abandon.

Funny how he now is mute.


	3. Reddening Gaze of Distortion

Two dozen meters into the thick fog are two silhouettes, sitting in the grime, allowing their already ash-stained apparel to further gray. Their voices are hushed but titillated and rather high pitched, strange sounds from their throat and tongues spill into the air as the two struggle to yell at each other under their breath, in something like an argument.

The albino eyes them, a slight glistering spreading over red irises and dilated pupils. Silent, not to be heard, he moves carefully and in inhumanly graceful movements he advances, only centimeters at a time.

One of the two beings, female it seems in a once-pink dress and a petite body, stands up and is seemingly cross with the other, that appears to be male, though there are some fairly feminine characteristics to him as well. The girls talks rather quietly in a fashion strange yet somewhat familiar.

The other sits leaned back to the rocks, groaning and grimacing.

It reminds the pale man of the man with the whitening eyes.

The sitting thing appears to be in pain, clutching one of the limbs that extend his shoulders into arms. It hangs at an impossible angle, obviously broken.

Perhaps it is the source of the earlier snap.

The silver-haired man's face adapts a slight greenish tone as he stares at the dark red liquid that creates almost perfect circles on the ground as they slowly drip from the injured beings arm, a stark contrast to the colorlessness that surrounds the now four bodies.

His sense of smell looks to work fine, for he looks rather bewildered when the the iron scent of blood enters his nostrils.

His face distorts into a grimace when the brain identifies a second odor: Rotting, decomposing whiffs of air fills his nose. The sitting one is not well.

Blood poisoning.

Perhaps even gangrene.

For a fraction of a second, his gaze is not human, but rather that of a beast. Then a fraction of man takes him over as he quickly decides to leave his almost-victims alone and draws backwards in the same swift, graceful movements he advanced with.

Slowly, slowly, silence ensues, he is not there, has never been, will never be, either.

Trembling with increasing shivers he returns to the still man and silently slips under the blanket with animal grace. Violently shaking, his whole being writhing in repulse, twitching and silently gasping, he slowly lifts his quivering hand covered in black leather.

Something hot and wet slowly dribbles down his unnaturally pale face as he stares at his five-fingered, human appendage.

With tremors still agitating his uncontrolled body, he allows his eyes to wander off to meet the empty gaze of the blond man and lets his teeth sink into a loose fist.

It tastes of filth and grime.


	4. Succumbing of Humanity

Long time passes before the creature finally opens its eyes. His now ravaged hand lies in his lap, smeared redness peeking bast black leather, telling of what happened earlier.

He looks at it with disgust for a moment, seemingly very distant to the memory of what he did.

At last, it looks like he can't handle the curiosity, he struggles not to wince at the sharp pains, like scalpels digging through flesh and tendons, as he pulls the glove off.

Blood, flesh, strings of tendon visible. Some dangle out of the crescent-shaped puncture-and-tear wound.

He looks at it, wide-eyed, horrified, and then his eyes settle for a more calm and knowing look.

There are numerous scars of similar appearance all up his wrist and arm, some more healed than others.

His expression is blank as he eyes his scarred limb. All are bite marks.

All except for one.

Halfway up his wrist, there is something that looks like a purple-ish, jagged circle. It is a bullet wound, and a rather fresh one at that, still the middle is covered by a crust of dried crimson, blackening and hardening day by day. It doesn't look healthy either; a distinct red flushing surrounds it, about the size of his palm.

The palm of his other hand.

His unmarred other hand.

In a look of deep concentration and something like fascination, he takes his attention off his mutilated arm and eyes the other, the still healthy appendage, an arm which tells of humanity. The skin is soft and white unlike that of the others, where deep scars rag its surface.

It was with that hand he used to calm his little brother down.

It was the hand which held the boy's tiny fingers, the hand that stroked him asleep when he was scared, the hand that ever so gently combed his hair and mended broken clothing. It was the hand that with a pencil recorded the growth of the little one each month, it created the set of marks on the kitchen door frame, tight lines that pulled further and further apart in the beginning of the twentieth century. Even though his brother was grown then and found it silly and childish, the now shorter big brother found it amusing to see how he grew.

It is with this hand he reaches to the dead body on his right side, the body he swore to protect.

He had failed.

He reaches out one of his hands to touch the corpse.

Cold, soft, pale skin meets his warm fingertips.

His appearance has changed drastically in very few moments, from beastly to tender and almost loving gestures. It almost looks as if he expects the creature to respond to his sweet touch.

No response.

He is dead.

An almost angry looks settles over the tender man's face, as he turns his body towards the deceased to face him, he sits up and-

A female voice is raised, panicking.

The man suddenly wakes up from his trance and remembers the two others.

The girl is seemingly very distressed.

The albino pulls the blanket down from himself without letting the dead man out of his eyesight. He curiously and this time almost casually walks towards the two strangers.

The girl is holding the boy's hand cupped in her hands, frantically speaking in a fast tongue. His eyes are dimmed, not seeing properly.

The pupils have stopped adjusting, the optic nerve has quit sending signals to the brain.

His mind is absent, ear drum beating but no nerve hairs react.

He is dying.

Hot, salty drops of water are streaming down her face. She is beautiful even in her agony, the pain of losing someone before her eyes.

His fingers are blackened with gangrene, his whole arm flushing with infection and the twaddle-tell, purple lines of blood poisoning. The lines must have reached his heart, for he tenses for a moment and then settles, leaning back towards the rocks, his head crashing against the rough surface. The rifle he had been holding falls down onto the gray.

In the distance, there is the trace and echo of a loud bang, amplified in the emptiness.

So must have been a country that just died.

The girl is stunned, suddenly lets go of him and clutches her chest.

She must be a country too, and the two of them most be closely connected by heart.

Her short, blond hair is ruffled by the wind, a blue ribbon loosely dangling of a couple of strands.

She collapses back into the grime, huffing, twitching, writhing in agony, letting out cries that rapidly duplicate in intensity and pain.

She throws her head back and her body urges out a savage roar of the cruelest woe that exists.


	5. Crimson on Gray

Such a beautiful creature, that girl.

Short, blond hair, ruffled by the wind and her sudden movements. A once-blue, ragged ribbon lies next to her. She is of petite build and the thin, threadbare dress would have suited her very well if it wasn't for the large tears and scratches all over it and the colorlessness it holds in comparison to the magnificent pink it once was. She is very thin too, but it is imaginable what a pretty girl she must have been with some meat underneath her pale, by sweat shined skin.

Now, she is nothing but barbaric.

She must have lost her mind when the boy's heart stopped beating.

Suddenly, the albino man is near her, and kneels down next to her. He bends his spine and reaches down to hold her still. He cups his hands around her cheeks the way she had cupped the boy's earlier, and it seems as if it is enough to lightly calm her down.

It is a somewhat disturbing sight, the girl's beautiful face with red, swollen and tear-filled eyes soiled by two hands, one gloved black, the other exposed to light, revealing its large flesh wounds and scars.

Her screaming weakens and grows softer, though they still pierce through the fog, and though it is obvious she is in gruesome pains, her body ceases to twitch.

Expressionless, the albino lets go of her and she immediately resumes her twitching and screaming.

Still blank-faced, he walks the two steps to the body of the young man to pick up the rifle.

The girl is chewing up froth and accomplishes gurgling sounds when breathing.

They are very alike. How strange.

He weighs the dirty rifle in his hands, and his face frowns when he finds it to be empty.

A couple of blood vessels in her eyes burst, and blood-mixed tears run down her fouled and troubled face.

His face is as cold as ever when he walks back to the girl and promptly crushes her skull with the rifle butt.

Her crying stops and her body is still, lying in the crimson contrast of the gray.

In the distance, there is another somewhat muffled boom.

The only thing that disturbs the recovered mute are the sobs of a lonely man.


	6. Prelude for Shattered Memories

On the very bottom of a deep ravine, in a ruined country painted gray and faded crimson, in a destroyed world surrounded by dead bodies of heaven, lies a cold girl, an inanimate boy, a cold man and a savage creature of silver and ruby. The creatures body is twitching and violent shakes ravage its body as it lets out pained, muffled cries of sorrow. There is nothing left of past pride and madness.

The little rays of sunlight that pierce through the gray are long gone before he is still.

It is pitch black when its muscles finally receive the electric pulses required to move its body. The man sways from side to side as he takes a couple of trembling steps into the dark. He needs numerous minutes before he can move like a regular human would.

His eyes are luminous and dreamy, an unnatural glow settling in his irises. The red and swollen areas underneath tell of his previous crying fits, barely concealing the darkened crescents beneath.

He must have gone mad, truly, for he walks over to the still corpses of a boy and a girl, jolts his head back and a cruel, disturbing laugh escapes from between his soft, pale lips.

The sick noise merely lasts for a minute, before his his eyes widen and he cannot stop a cry of shock from emerging, a high pitched note accomplished by strained vocal chords, and his face adapts a horrified look of recognition of familiar faces and regret, before it twists into a wicked grimace and more transparent drops emanate from his already dried-out eyes, running down his cheeks to further wet and irritate his pale skin.

Still sniffing, the red-eyed man drags the remainders of the girl to lie next to the body of the young man, gloomily shuts their eyes and uses some of his own saliva to wet a piece of cloth for wiping filth off their faces.

Some humanity is still left.

He stands tall and straight, salutes the two and turns around on his heel, all in the manner of a soldier.

Perhaps this man was, once upon a time. After all, there is an Iron Cross with oak leaves on the collar of his dusty shirt, as is on the breast pocket of the cold man's uniform.

Yes, they must have been soldiers of high rankings, for the left side of their uniforms are almost covered entirely with ribbons of various orders, and their Iron Crosses are the only medallions present.

They have been richly rewarded for something in the army.

Once upon a time, that is.

Once upon a time when both were sane and warm, and alive.

A/N

GAH this was a hassle to write D: I don't know how many times I've rewritten it trying to get everything in the way I wanted it to be. But yeah, here it is, anyhow.

Thank you SO much for your kind words in your reviews, guys. It means a lot to me, it really does. I strongly appreciate you taking time not only to read my writing but also spur me on to keep writing :)

It may not seem like much, but your thoughts and critiques really matter to me, so if there's anything you like, dislike or are confused about, please feel free to tell me.

:)


	7. Silent Shouts of Warning

The albino walks towards the corpse of the blonde, with a, barely visible but present nonetheless, green shade over his face. It is a wonder he can find the man whatsoever, for the dark in combination with the fog makes it very difficult to see. Not that it looks to be an issue for this man, as it is with an almost eerie precision he finds the body and strokes the cold, pale skin that covers still muscles and white bone of his face. It is a ravaged hand that performs the action, a hand of deep bite wounds in which dirt have gotten into and infected. A hand that without help will turn flush red and purple, a hand that will send out red snakes of poison to the man's heart, a hand that will rebel its owner and kill it, just like the boy's snapped arm betrayed its master.

A hand of revolution.

The albino winces and looks as if he is about to cry again, a pained expression on his face that washes the green away.

The hand moves to the man's chin and lifts it slightly, tilting the empty mind backwards.

The same hand that swore to protect this very body, so many years, decades, centuries ago, the same hand that swung many swords in hatred, all to protect the oath and boy he loved so deeply.

All was in vain. There is nothing left to hold on to for this man, nothing but a heavy, cold body.

With pain still contorting his face, he moves closer to the corpse and grabs him firmly around the waist. He squeezes his eyelids together and holds in a lungful of air as he hoists the heavy load onto his left shoulder, the blond head hanging against the back of the albino's dusty uniform.

The much smaller man stumbles under the weight of the dead, a struggle to find balance for them both. He moves significantly from their original position, all in circles, always trying to find balance.

Then finally, slightly leaning to both the right and forwards, he settles and takes a couple of burdened strides.

He then lunges forwards and dashes into the dark, muscles heavily at work, brain frantically interpreting the small signals it receives from the eyes, as fast as his body possibly can move with the load of the dark, the terrain and the body on his shoulder.

He is running, running away.

He couldn't possibly be afraid of death, could he?

No.

He is – or was – a soldier, he must have killed and stared death into the eyes before, he just crushed the skull of a girl, and on top of that he is carrying a dead body on his back.

He is not afraid of death.

Uphill, uphill, uphill, out of the ravine. It is a deep trench with a jagged and sharp terrain, unfriendly and somewhat intimidating. The already rapid breaths getting heavier and more shallow with each step, he finally reaches a ridge with a small path trampled up by goats. From there it looks to be easier, a fine line where thousands of little feet must have walked before.

He draws his eyes shut, clenches his fists and squeezes his jaw tight as the lactic acid gathers in his struggling ankles and thighs, and pushes harder onto the ground, taking bigger and bigger leaps.

Then his mouth opens as he draws in vast amounts of air, and silently mouths something to himself.

A bizarre sight it is, a madman running for his life with a body on his back, a body that really is far too heavy for him, a limp body that really should be the one carrying the one running.

Uphill, uphill, uphill, over the ridge onto another, past vertiginous chasms, past everything around him, through the gray, away from the mute, from the dead, from the beauty that once was, from the ghosts of the past that haunt him, all while mumbling those silent words that seem to strengthen his pale body. Once-black, worn out boots thud against the ground, heavy breaths cut through the night, the scent of adrenaline stark in the air. Occasionally there is the disturbing sound of little pieces of rock and gravel bouncing down into deep pits and chutes, and the seemingly never-ending echoes thereof.

He reaches an old, wooden sign, partially covered in moss and lichen, broken and unreadable, some parts crushed by stones, crushed like the little skull of a girl. Surrounding it are pieces of an old wire fence, once dark green and tall, now rusty, blackened and gray like the rest of the world. Only two fence posts remain upright, yet both are crooked and snapped like toothpicks, snapped like the arm of a certain boy. At the very bottom of the ancient sign, on a plank that was once nailed to an upright pole, is a carved-in symbol. It is large and visible despite everything that must have hit, worn and broken the sign. It is the symbol of a skull and crossbones.

A warning to whoever passes, a warning of death.

The albino doesn't even slow down for a second, no, he allows a smile to flicker over his face and pushes his exhausted body further.

After all, who is there to stop him?

**A/N**

YAY yet another chapter :3 Much longer than usually, too :D

Are you guys okay with the short chapters? I like to write short, it gives a bit more suspense and allows me to update more than once a week. I thought I might keep it like this for a while and perhaps pull some chapters together once I've finished it all, but I haven't decided fully on that point yet ^^

Thank you guys so much for all your kind words, I really appreciate it :)


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